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[Eric Chancey]

...are full/part time at their church? Just curious really.

[crain]

If you call full time 60+ hours...
count me in.

peace
jon

[Mike Galica]

Part-time volunteers are all we have at our church.

[Dan Timon]

I am part-time. We have 4 permanent full-time audio, about 12 part-time audio, including 3 or 4 who are temporarily full time, plus a full-time TD, plus video and lighting full and part-time people.

Regards,

Dan Timon

[Les]

Our church is at 3000 members, we have 4 sound volunteers for the main sancuary and 2 for Sr. High. I take the lead and put in an average of 10-15hrs/week taking care of/maintaining (non-paid) the sound systems. With all of the activities going on during the week we can not keep up, so we just hired a full time sound/video editor who will start in a few weeks.

[can't hear myself]

500 member church. 3 part time sound volunteers.

[Eric Chancey]

It looks like there is a nice mix of staff and volunteers.
Dan, that's a big crew! Where do you go to church?

My next question is, What keeps you motivated, what keeps you going? I know the obvious answer of doing God's work and that should be first and formost but, after a really crazy service, what keeps you from becoming an usher?
God bless you all!
Eric

[Dan Timon]

I go to McLean Bible Church just outside the DC Beltway.

I love mixing monitors, and I love the musicians that I serve. For me, it is a big deal to be able to get the distractions out of their mix, so they can have fun and do their job.

Besides the fact that we are blessed with a bunch of phenomenally talented people, they are also exceptionally nice people. What makes it still worthwhile after the tough services is that is extremely well organized for a church. All the equipment is topnotch, and is very well maintained, and we all know what to do, so it makes a potentially tough service an easy one. On Easter, we used sidecars at FOH and monitor world-I had 75 inputs at monitor world, and was mixing 14 mixes-and it was like a regular day because everything was so organized and well managed. It really helps to have skilled stage managers to manage the musicians and A2s to sort out mis-patched items and guitar rig buzzes.

Regards,

Dan Timon

[Susie]

At my church in the UK (approx 600 congregation) they haven't yet seen the need to employ anyone.  When I worked for them (for 3 years ending last summer) I probably put in 10 hours a week just looking after one section of the PA and lighting system - it was never enough to keep up with maintenance as the building and portable PAs get used almost every day for some function or another.  It wasn't paid time.  Since I left they have a head of PA dept who has a full time job elsewhere and does all the upkeep in his own time.  The lights no longer get maintained!  They asked me to do it, I asked if it was paid, then laughed at the look on their faces!
At some point they will have to employ someone at least part time as the church is growing fast, but for now are willing to rely on the free service of a few.
I don't know any churches (although there must be some) in the UK, who employ specifically for PA upkeep.

[Tom Roche]

I'm in charge of sound and equipment maintenance at our relatively small church.  I can't be behind the board during P&W music as I'm the drummer, so I have someone watch it in case something goes wrong.  All of us who help are volunteers.  

I spend anywhere from two to four hours a week on sound.  Since we recently moved into a newer building, I've had to work nearly full time installing a snake, mucho soldering, equipment set up, and rigging everything together.  Almost there!

Tom

[Dan Timon]

It is interesting to note how often a church's need for technical expertise lags behind its willingness to pay for it. I think that it is a critical hurdle that the church must get over in order to grow to the next level, because frustrated musicians and members who are distracted by technical gaffes and bad sound will go to another church. The cream always rises to the top.

When a job becomes so critical to a church that it is essential, and/or when the job demands more than 10 hours or so a week from a worker, it is time to pay that worker, or at least offer to pay that worker. An unpaid volunteer who is too important can either get burned out or lose sight of the fact that he is a minister-and leverage his importance into too prominent a position of power.

Regards,

Dan Timon

[Billy Merrill]

Small church of 100-150 on Sundays.  On audio I do 90% of the work with fill-in help when I can't be there. All of us are volunteers. Usually takes from 2-5 hours of time a week.  I also take care of the video, office computers and the LAN when needed.

[JohnnyB]

Only volunteer at about 15 hrs. per week.  Gymnatorium seats 500.  Off-site video venue seats 250.  Total Sunday attendance over 3000.  We run 5 services in the main auditorium and two at the venue, plus a full worship on Wednesday night.  Rehearsals are Mon., Tue., Wed. & Thu. nights to cover all the different services.  I "direct" two other "main" guys and multiple  others. Two of us rotate each Sunday and a third guy handles the off-site venue.

John Barbour

[Rob Warren]

I am a full-time 40+ hours a week engineer. We have the main sanctuary (2700 seats)  plus a K-12 school with a Gym and family center.  All have functions in them with installed systems. Along with a couple portable systems for classroom setups or offsite meetings.  Also, a pro-tools system in a small recording studio behind stage.  

Rob

[James Turner]

Volunteer at a number of churches in my local area with my time and my kit, (SW London UK) for things ranging from worship services to pantomimes and theatre productions.

How many hours a week depends on how many events...

For example I would probably have put at lot more hours into Soul in the City when it comes to London on the first week in August - however it's my Honeymoon that week so I won't be arround, (Though my rigs probably will be..)

James

[bates15]

Voulenteer, no idea how many hours. Just love doing it. I am the guitar player and stand in bass/keys pleyer to so i get to walk arround a bit.

Good point having the church pay the tech. It is only a big problem for the pastor to do that. We have a 700 seat church and when it comes time to pay the offerings and so on you would think we were a 150 seat church. Pastors all over the world have that problem. Even the 3000+ churches. Only thing there is that the number of paying (and obediant) church go-ers is a bit higher.

(ps excuse my typing, i have lived in Holland to long to type English without mistakes)

Nate

[Stirling Flynn]

I am the 1 full time live and studio audio engineer as well as the Director of Information Technology. We also have a full time technical director and his full time technical assistant.

As staff, we serve side by side with our weekend volunteers (NO WAY we could survive without our gracious volunteers!) and we also cover things like weekly maintenance, changes, moves, etc. as well as those events that would be hard to staff with volunteers (memorial services during the week and other weekday events).

[CGuerette]

Volunteer Technical Director - sometimes it feels like full-time volunteer  

Our church seats 800 with avg Sunday am attendance hovering around the 500 mark.

Our team consists of 4 audio techs, 2 projection techs and 1 video recording tech.  I am always looking for new people but sometimes it is hard to get people to commit to the job.

I don't think I am hard on people (far from it) but my attitude is to always do the very best we can with the resources we have.

There are no paid technical staff but if there were, I would certainly apply for the job.

[Mike Sveda]

Volunteer Sound Tech.  

[Thomas Harkin]

For 11 years I was full time Technical Director at a 2,000 member church.  I oversaw the transition from lyrics in bulletins, to slides, to computer.

After firing two part time audio guys, the administration "made" me take over mixing duties.  We produced two MAJOR musical dramas a year, with up to 12 wireless mics, an 80 to 100 voice choir, and usually a pretty good sized band.

After all that,  I still feel like I don't know anything!!  

I'm now one of 4 part time sound guys at an 800 member church and loving every minute of it, whether I'm at the mixer, or, not!

Thomas

[Steve Stallings]

 We are pretty small here at First Baptist Bremond. I think we get about 70-100 on Sundays. I am chief volunteer, bottle washer, tech, drummer, bassist, guitarist, pedal steel player, vocalist, and keyboard hack. I have recently self funded a system for our Praise band and youth center. This system is pretty well documented in the lounge so I won't go into it. My 17 y/o is mixing FOH (actually side of house..lol!) and my 15 y/o is playing guitar. It's all voluntary. I practice family medicine in a rural Christian clinic for the poor during the week.

[David Harvey]

Strictly volunteer.  We have three main sound guys and we split the Sundays out about equally among the three of us.  Rehearsals last about 2 hours on Wednesdays.  Standard worship/praise: multiple vocalist, drums, bass, acc guitar x2, piano and keyboards.  We have around 900 each Sunday split between two services The church has a full time ‘programming director’ who manages all the technical stuff but she is always directing the services while we do the actual hands on running of the board.  I also act as part of the drama team and do some other IT work for the church (my day job is IT management).  

All-in-all I average about five hours a week volunteering.

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